Mahatma Gandhi Quotes About War
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The end of nonviolent 'war' is always an agreement, never dictation, much less humiliation of the opponent.
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I cannot give active support in the war effort without denying a life-time of practice.
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Victory attained by violence is tantamount to a defeat for it is momentary.
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People engaged in a war do not lose temper over matters which affect the fortunes of war.
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Whoever is victor, there should be, after the war, a commonwealth of all nations.
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Democracy necessarily means a conflict of will and ideas, involving sometimes a war of the knife between different ideas.
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Truth and non-violence are not cloistered virtues but applicable as much in the forum and the legislatures as in the market place.
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I believe that it is impossible to end hatred with hatred.
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I have not lost the hope that the masses will refuse to bow to the Moloch of war but they will rely upon their own capacity for suffering to save their country's honour.
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War is an unmitigated evil. But it certainly does one good thing. It drives away fear and brings bravery to the surface.
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I contend that non-violent acts exert pressure far more effective than violent acts, for the pressure comes from goodwill and gentleness.
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In the secret of my heart I am in perpetual quarrel with God that He should allow such things [as the war] to go on. My non-violence seems almost impotent. But the answer comes at the end of the daily quarrel that neither God nor non-violence is impotent. Impotence is in men. I must try on without losing faith even though I may break in the attempt.
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What kind of victory is it when someone is left defeated? What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy. What is a war criminal? Was not war itself a crime against God and humanity, and, therefore, were not all those who sanctioned, engineered and conducted wars, war criminals? The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. Non-cooperation with evil is a sacred duty.
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When there is war, the poet lays down the lyre, the lawyer his law reports, the schoolboy his books.
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History is a record of perpetual wars, but we are now trying to make new history.
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As in laws or in war, the longest purse finally wins.
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Was not war itself a crime against God and humanity, and therefore, were not all those who sanctioned, engineered and conducted wars, war criminals?
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You cannot stop big wars if you carry on little wars yourselves.
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I appeal for cessation of hostilities, not because you are too exhausted to fight, but because war is bad in essence. You want to kill Nazism. You will never kill it by its indifferent adoption.
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Morality is contraband in war.
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If that is the law of life we must work it out in daily exisitance. Wherever there are wars, wherever we are confronted with an opponent, conquer by love. I have found that the certain law of love has answered in my own life as the law of destruction has never done.
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No Swaraj government with any pretension to being a popular government can possibly be organised and maintained on a war-footing.
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I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
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Exploitation and domination of one nation over another can have no place in a world striving to put an end to all war.
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What is a war criminal? Was not war itself a crime against God and humanity, and, therefore, were not all those who sanctioned, engineered, and conducted wars, war criminals? War criminals are not confined to the Axis Powers alone. Roosevelt and Churchill are no less war criminals than Hitler and Mussolini. England, America and Russia have all of them got their hands dyed more or less red - not merely Germany and Japan.
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I believe all war to be wholly wrong.
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The science of war leads one to dictatorship, pure and simple. The science of non-violence alone can lead one to pure democracy. Power based on love is thousand times more effective and permanent than power derived from fear of punishment. It is a blasphemy to say non-violence can be practiced only by individuals and never by nations which are composed of individuals. The nearest approach to purest anarchy would be a democracy based on non-violence. A society organized and run on the basis of complete non-violence would be the purest anarchy.
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When a man vowed to nonviolence as the law governing human beings dares to refer to war, he can only do it so as to strain every nerve to avoid it.
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The author of the Mahabharata has not established the necessity of physical warfare; on the contrary he has proved its futility.
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So far as I can see, the atomic bomb has deadened the finest feeling that has sustained for ages. There used to be so-called laws of war, which made it tolerable. Now we know the truth. War knows no law except that of might. The atomic bomb brought an empty victory but it resulted for the time being in destroying the soul of Japan. What has happened to the soul of the destroying nation is yet too early to see.
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Mahatma Gandhi
- Born: October 2, 1869
- Died: January 30, 1948
- Occupation: Civil rights leader
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